Meaning & Analysis
If the lion's skin (symbolizing strength) is insufficient, then the fox's skin (symbolizing cunning) must be used to compensate—suggesting that when brute force fails, cleverness must suffice.
Insights
Cunning Over Strength
Suggests that intelligence and strategy can achieve what sheer power cannot, promoting wit as an alternative to force in achieving success.
Pragmatic Adaptability
Advocates for the blending of strength and cunning—where boldness must be tempered by calculation when circumstances demand it.
Ends Justify the Means
Carries a morally ambiguous tone: when noble means (strength, honor) fall short, one may resort to deceit or trickery to prevail.
Classical and Humanist Legacy
This proverb is rooted in Erasmus’s *Adagia*, drawn from a classical tradition that values both martial might and political cunning. It reflects a Renaissance admiration for Machiavellian duality: the prince must be both lion and fox.
Realpolitik Philosophy
The proverb aligns with Machiavellian political thought—where rulers and agents must combine overt power with covert guile to maintain authority and survive adversaries.
Moral Ambivalence
While practical, the proverb implies ethical flexibility. It reveals the human tendency to rationalize deceit or manipulation as necessary when straightforward approaches fail.
Universal Leadership Lesson
Beyond politics, the proverb offers a lesson in leadership and problem-solving: boldness is admirable, but success often requires subtlety and psychological insight.
Rhetorical Devices
Metaphor
Uses the contrasting skins of the lion and fox to represent two fundamental strategies—force and cunning—making the abstract dichotomy vividly concrete.
Synecdoche
The 'skin' stands for the entire character or method of the animal (lion for strength, fox for cunning), a part representing the whole strategic style.
Antithesis
Juxtaposes strength and cunning to underscore the necessity of combining opposites—a rhetorical structure that reinforces the proverb’s philosophical depth.
Transcription
Quotations
Si leonina pellis non satis est, vulpina addenda.
King Antigonus . . aunswered . . if the Lions skin be not enough, take the Wolfes too.
Haste thou not hearde this precepte of Lycurgus, where the Lyons skin will not serue, sow the Foxes to it, that is to interprete it, where honest force will not auaile, use fraude and falshood, and set conscience to sale.
And where the lion's hide is thin and scant, I'll firmly patch it with the fox's fell.
Coudre la peau du renard a celle du lyon.
[The King] determined (after the old prouerbe) when the Lions tayle is short, to tye the Foxe tayle to him, to make proofe, seeing force would not preuaile, what policy would doe.
The Foxe must help, if that the Lyon faile.
I thinke twere good to peece the Lyons skinne where it too short falls, with the Foxes skinne.
That a Lion cannot doe, a Foxe can doe.
(cannot doe it).
To sow the Foxes Skin to the Lions. *Suttlenes where Strength wantes.
To sow a fox tail to the Lion's skin, viz. to joyn cunning with strength.
The Foxes tail will serue to piece out the Lions skin.
If not with that of the Lion, with that of the fox.
Policy goes beyond strength.
Piece out the Lyons skin with the foxes tail; sew the foxes tail to the Lyons skin.
To patch a Foxe's Tail to a Lion's Skin, to use both sleight and might.
Shakespeare Citations
Is your gold and silver ewes and rams?
Cross References
Related Proverbs
Original Scan
Used under CC BY-NC 3.0.